AUTOMOTIVE MOTORCYCLE

For thieves, motorcycles can seem like an easy target. Light enough for a well-equipped thief to simply carry away, motorcycle theft poses a threat to all riders that requires a number of possible solutions. According to the National Insurance Crime Bureau, 2009 saw 56,093 thefts across America, a 13 percent overall decrease from 2008. To react to such a widespread problem, security manufacturers have generated locks for diverse parts of the motorcycle, some best used to combat one type of theft over another.

Some of the quickest, least bulky solutions to bike safety can prevent thieves from riding off on the bike they are stealing. These locks can include throttle lever locks, which make it impossible for a thief to apply any throttle until a key unlocks the system. Also included are disk locks, which often serve as highly visual security devices, advertising the owner’s level of responsibility in protecting their motorcycle. The failure of these types of locks remains their inability to stop a thief from lifting the motorcycle into a truck bed or similar storage area, and leaving with the bike in their possession.

For cases when a bike needs to be tethered to a wall or fence for maximum protection, there are stronger locks available. By using a cable lock or u-shaped bolt lock, connecting a motorcycle to a stationary wall or field becomes an easy way to borrow the strength of that barrier in foiling would-be thieves. Additionally, fully stationary bike anchors offer the highest level of security solutions, as dismantling either the lock or the bike would be necessary to break the hold of these types of locks.

Inversely, if you have protected your bike, but the lock has caused a malfunction, you need to consult a motorcycle accident attorney to learn more about product defect negligence.

You may have heard the term “jetting” before and wondered what it meant. Jetting is the act of adjusting the separate fuel circuits in a carburetor to optimize the fuel/air mixture going into the engine. To the untrained person jetting can come across as being very complicated and some people fear the process. Once you understand which circuits control what part of the throttle cycle, you will learn that jetting isn’t at all that difficult. The following will describe what each circuit does and how to adjust that circuit for optimum performance. This assumes that you have a Keihin FCR type carburetor (the information translates to other carburetors as well) which is found on almost every modern high performance four stroke ATV engine.

Fuel screw: Adjusts the “hang up” of the engine when you go from wide open to idle quickly. If your engine doesn’t smoothly idle back down or “hangs up” when you let off the throttle you need to adjust the fuel screw out (richer) to clean this up. If your engine idles down and then dies you need to turn the screw in (leaner) to allow less gas into the engine. Play around with the screw until your engine idles down smoothly.

Pilot jet: Controls 0 to 1/4 throttle. This jet requires the least amount of adjusting over the rest. If your engine cuts out when you rev it up then you need to make this richer (higher number) if it bogs when you rev it up you need to make this leaner (lower number).

Needle jet: Controls 1/4 to 3/4 throttle. You can tell the most when this is out of tune when you do holeshots. If your engine is bogging when you dump the clutch on a holeshot or you are riding at a constant 1/2 throttle and you engine is bogging then you need to move the c-clip up one notch (drops the needle making it leaner). If the engine is cutting out in these situations you need to move the c-clip down one notch (raises the needle making it richer). Setting the c-clip in the middle slot is a good place to start.

Main jet: Controls 3/4 to full throttle and also affects all other jets slightly. This circuit is tested when you hold the throttle wide open. If your engine is bogging the you need to make the jet leaner (lower number) and if it is pinging or cutting out you need to make it richer (higher number).